Tonight I had a delightful half hour chat in the Flyers' pressroom before Philadelphia's 5-0 whitewash of the Red Wings with Detroit's long time GM
Kenny Holland along with my old friend, Hockey Hall of Fame and former Flyer defenseman
Mark Howe, Detroit's current head of pro scouting. The three of us talked for most of the time about the start of Kenny's eight year pro playing career in 1976 as a 21-year old rookie goalie with the
Binghamton Broome Dusters in the rough and tumble
North American Hockey League. I was the PR man for the NAHL
Philadelphia Firebirds at the same time, and Kenny and I spent the time tonight laughing uproariously about many of the
SLAP SHOT type players and incidents we both recalled from those days. Among the tough as nails teammates Holland played with while with the Dusters was then future NHL referee (and current HockeyBuzz blogger)
Paul Stewart. (The previous season the Dusters had also "employed" legendary badman
Billy Goldthorpe, the model for SLAP SHOT's "Ogie Oglethorpe".)
A typical "meeting" between the NAHL Firebirds and Dusters
Kenny and I had a very similar conversation in the same Flyers' perssroom a few years back before a preseason Flyers/Wings game with
Scotty Bowman (who was then still working with Detroit) sitting at the same table. After a few minutes of listening in to our boisterous conversation back then, Scotty -- who has always prided himself for knowing about virtually every player who ever played the pro game -- said to us in what almost seemed to be frustrated puzzlement"
"You two sure know a lot of guys. I've never heard of any of them!" As it was then, it was a blast to reminisce with Kenny again tonight about our past experiences in what was the "real" Federal League.
Kenny Holland as a Dusters' rookie in 1976
"To play hockey in the NAHL back then as I did then for all of $6,600 for the year (roughly $85 a game)
you were certainly doing it mostly for the love of the game.", Kenny said to me tonight.
"But we sure had a good time in those days too!"
Amen, Kenny, and so did I!
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